Dossier 13: The Metaverse

Currently, billions are being invested in the development of ‘the metaverse’ by companies that benefit from a fully digital future. But while the metaverse seems to be on everyone’s lips, it’s not here yet. Is a single unified place called ‘the metaverse’ even possible? And what will be the ecological and material impact of using so much raw computing power to keep a parallel digital world endlessly online? In this dossier, unfolding over the two months, we’ll be sharing our foray into the metaverse and its many facets and tangents. We started with Margarita Osipian’s interview with Marina Otero Verzier about the metaverse’s potential to radically change our data storage infrastructures, followed by an interview with Babusi Nyoni about building a decentralised African metaverse, and an exploration of the ‘metabody’ and its possibility of movements by Guus Hoeberechts. We’ve also partnered up with our friendly AI systems to create a glossary unpacking all the metaverse-esque terminology in our digital vocabulary. And finally, we’ll be sharing an essay questioning who asked for the metaverse.